You've probably seen optical illusions made by Akiyoshi Kitaoka, a psychology professor in Japan. (His most famous illusion is called "Rotating Snakes.")

While I was looking through his site I noticed the illusion he calls Donguriko, and wondered if the illusion would also work with letters. I used the graphic software Gimp to recreate the same bright reds and yellows, airbrushed some green on the left side of the letters, then copied and reversed some of the words. You can compare my attempt to a portion of Mr. Kitaoka's original illusion, below.

It's interesting that even though my letters are not as three-dimensional as his ovals, and I didn't use as much green, the illusion still works (although my movement illusion is not as strong.) The green side of the shapes or letters appear to move in that direction.

A section of the Donguriko optical

illusion by Akiyoshi Kitaoka.

(Click to enlarge)

Here's a section of the optical illusion

"Rotating Snakes" by Akiyoshi Kitaoka.

I also noticed that the green, yellow and red combination appears on the headlines of old circus banners. Do these colors vibrate together in some kind of "illusionistic" frequency?

The painter combined green, red and yellow to attract attention.Sorry, there was never a "Mermaid Thrower."(Click to enlarge)